9 Years Later, Taylor Sheridan's Best Thriller Quote Beats Anything He Ever Did On 'Yellowstone'

Published Oct 23, 2026, 11:09 PM EDT

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Carolyn Jenkins is a voracious consumer of film and television. She graduated from Long Island University with an MFA in Screenwriting and Producing where she learned the art of character, plot, and structure. The best teacher is absorbing media and she spends her time reading about different worlds from teen angst to the universe of Stephen King.

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Taylor Sheridan’s second act was one far different from the first. After leaving the fan-favorite series, Sons of Anarchy, in his role as Deputy Hale, he went on to create one of the most recognizable crime dramas of the decade. Yellowstone ushered in a new age where neo-Westerns took over pop culture. The saga of the Dutton family premiered in 2018 on the Paramount Channel and had everything going for it.

Kevin Costner led the series in an inspired choice of casting. The iconic Western actor plays John Dutton, the patriarch of the ranching empire in Montana. Yellowstone follows the trials of the family that has lived on the ranch for generations as they attempt to hold on to their legacy. Now Paramount has become the Yellowstone channel, with spin-offs coming out of the woodwork. Still, it is the farthest thing from Sheridan’s greatest achievement. A year before Yellowstone came to fruition, Sheridan wrote and directed Wind River, his most personal and gripping feature film yet. Five seasons of Yellowstone couldn’t hold up to the grim depiction of crimes against Indigenous women and the line that has beaten all others in the Sheridan playbook.

‘Wind River’s Tear-Jerking Quote Refused to Allow a Powerful Character to Be Victimized

Yellowstone is no stranger to depicting the realities of the Indigenous community. Kelsey Asbille’s character Monica is the point of view for this perspective and the perspective of how people on reservations are treated. But before she was cast in the neo-Western, she was the focal point of Wind River. Asbille plays Natalie, a young woman whose death kicks off the events of the movie. Wind River refuses to allow Natalie to just be another dead girl in a crime story.

The character gets screen time via flashbacks and her relationship with local hunter Cory’s (Jeremy Renner) daughter. The film centers around the horrifying fact that there are no statistics for missing Indigenous women. This is a demographic that is not tracked, and crimes against them have reached epidemic proportions. Wind River concludes in the most sensitive way, getting justice for Natalie’s death while still showing her importance as a character.

Cory learns that while Natalie was visiting her boyfriend who worked for a security firm, the rest of the men in the camp assaulted her, leaving her for dead. She ran in the snow to get help and eventually died from the cold. Cory ensures that the punishment fits the crime when he gives her defacto killer, Pete (James Jordan), the same chance she did. He drags Pete out into the cold, stating that if he can get as far as she could, he would be free. Cory, of course, knows there is no chance of this when he asks the man if he knows how far Natalie had to run before she eventually expired.

“Six miles. Barefoot,” Cory says, before adding succinctly: “That’s a warrior.” This line is simple but gives Natalie her due. She is worth more than all the men that assaulted her -- and killed her boyfriend -- combined. She had the heart of a champion and deserved more, just like all the other Indigenous women who are going missing around the country.

Cory has no intention of letting the man go, and just as intended, Pete never makes it to freedom. This is a powerful sequence that became one of Taylor Sheridan’s greatest feats in filmmaking. Yellowstone may be popular, but it could never measure up to the justice and grief that Wind River insists upon.